Protective Mechanisms - Principles and Examples

Leading practice examples – Protective affordable housing policies

Principles of leading practice

Leading practice examples - Protective affordable housing policies

NSW SEPP No. 10: Retention of Low Cost Rental Housing

SEPP 10 provides a mandatory planning framework to regulate and mitigate the loss of low-cost rental housing in the Sydney metropolitan region. As well as controls on demolition, the policy establishes a social impact assessment framework to determine the impact of accommodation loss on existing low income tenants, and provides for various mitigation measures in cases where applications are approved. These measures include maintaining a proportion of the new development at a fixed rent for a defined period, a financial payment, and or assistance to former tenants with rehousing.

City of Port Philip – protection of rooming houses

The City of Port Phillip in inner Melbourne has a comprehensive local planning policy to protect existing ‘rooming houses’ from redevelopment. This policy is supported by a package of local forms of assistance to assist operators to remain viable. The planning scheme actively encourages the development of new rooming houses in the area.

Hastings Council – Social Impact Assessment Policy

Hastings Council, on the mid-north coast of New South Wales, requires a Social Impact Study to be prepared for residential and rural residential rezonings. Social Impact Studies must also be submitted by applicants for a range of other matters, including:

• displacement of permanent or holiday accommodation for lower-income people
• housing for older people or people with a disability
• caravan parks and mobile home parks
• tourist facilities with a value in excess of $2 million.

The policy includes a range of social impacts and issues to be addressed by the applicant. Council has prepared a guide to preparing a social impact study, but the specific requirements for individual studies are determined in consultation with Council planners.

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Principles of leading practice

Protective mechanisms

Leading practice in the use of protective mechanisms for affordable housing observes the following principles:

• Ensure planning instruments contain an overall planning objective to maintain existing levels of affordable housing.
• Require social impact assessments to be conducted for development that could threaten the existing supply of affordable housing.
• Introduce specific controls to preserve particular types of housing stock that may be threatened by redevelopment.
• Support protective mechanisms with incentives or offsets designed to enhance or maintain the amenity, standards and viability of low-cost housing.
• Maintain accurate and up-to-date information about existing affordable housing stock within the local area, so development assessment officers can identify applications that may threaten sources of affordable housing, and assess the potential impacts of this for residents in housing need.
• Monitor losses to the low-cost housing sector as well as any replacement stock.
• Consult local public housing staff and or community housing providers when a boarding house, caravan park or manufactured home estate closes, and seek their advice when developing a mitigation strategy, particularly if the strategy involves assistance with rehousing.

Pitfalls to avoid

• Avoid introducing planning controls for low-cost housing forms (like boarding houses) that are unnecessarily prescriptive and which might deter operators from undertaking necessary health and safety works to upgrade their stock, or otherwise discourage them from remaining in the low-cost housing sector. Alternatives to prescriptive (’black letter) regulation, such as risk-based or performance-based approaches, promote flexibility and can reduce costs while preserving significant outcomes such as safety.
• Ensure that protective mechanisms do not encourage operators to ‘run their properties down’ or leave them vacant as a way of demonstrating poor viability and need for demolition or redevelopment.
• Avoid introducing protective measures that deter new applications for replacement or additional low-cost housing developments within the area.

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